The World Wide Web allows for the access of information on the Internet by permitting a user to navigate Internet resources without the user having knowledge of specific Internet Protocol (IP) addresses or other technical knowledge. The Web does away with command-line utilities, which typically require a user to transmit sets of commands to communicate with an Internet server. Instead, the Web is made up of thousands of interconnected web sites.
In order to access a web site, a user utilizes a uniform resource locator (URL) or domain name associated with the site. Because there are so many web sites in existence today and the number of web sites is always increasing, a domain name must first be registered with a domain name registration service. In that manner, it can be ensured that two web sites owned by two different people will not have the same domain name.
A domain name registration service is responsible for accepting a request for a domain name from an individual or a corporation (e.g., registrant) and determining whether or not the domain name is already in use by somebody else. If the domain name is already taken, then the requester must choose a different domain name. If the domain name is available, then the requester is allowed to exclusively use the name and have it registered and stored in a database that maintains all of the domain names currently registered with that domain name registration service.
Previously, one domain name registration service, owned by Network Solutions, Inc., provided for the registration of all second-level domain (SLD) names in the .com, .org, .net, .edu, .gov, and mil top level domain (TLD) names. The database maintained by the service was a global database that stored information that could be propagated in Internet zone files on the Internet so that domain names could be found and accessed by users around the world. Network Solutions, Inc. was allowed to be the sole provider of registration services pursuant to a bid won for a five-year National Science Foundation (NSF) Cooperative Agreement.
As more businesses and individuals adopted the Internet, the registration of domain names grew significantly. The rapid adoption of the world wide web and the explosion in domain name registration led the government to believe that competition should be introduced at the retail level in the registration of domain names. Accordingly, there is presently a need for a system and method capable of accommodating an unlimited number of registration retailers, e.g., registrars, which are each responsible for registrant acquisition and user support, while keeping a global database for certain TLD names under the control of a single experienced entity for stability and security.